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What Would Mr Kipling Say?

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by Petunia Winegum on March 25, 2015

As far as I’m aware, ‘Gay Cake’ isn’t slang for some tricky, non-missionary position, but I bow to the wisdom of any readers who know otherwise. The phrase first appeared in the context of an actual cake when a message of support for gay marriage was requested as the icing on it at a Belfast baker’s several months ago – alongside (don’t laugh) an image of Bert and Ernie from ‘Sesame Street’. The request was rejected on the grounds that the message promoted something the baker disagreed with, and the disgruntled punter with the sweet tooth decided he was the victim of a discriminatory act; he happened to be a member of a group calling itself the ‘Queer Space Collective’ and he brought the incident to the attention of the Northern Ireland Equality Commission. The hysteria that has subsequently arisen will climax in the courtroom, but in the meantime the moral battle-lines have been drawn.

Northern Ireland First Minister Peter Robinson has been the most prominent voice opposed to what the contested cake represents, feeling that the baker being found guilty of discrimination would be to unfairly curb religious freedoms. Whilst Ulster’s Catholic community tend to get the credit for playing the faith card when confronted by any deviation from Adam and Eve, the Protestant community are arguably even more conservative in such matters. Robinson is, of course, Protestant, and his 60+ wife once notoriously voiced her moral concern over the spread of depraved deviation – coincidentally whilst she was engaged in an extramarital affair with a teenage boy, which clearly didn’t count. Ironically, the furore has united some on both sides of Ulster’s sectarian divide in the anti-cake camp, with unlikely bedfellows also featured in the pro-cake camp such as Sinn Fein and gay activists.

That the baker at the centre of this bizarre affair has been targeted by the all-too familiar agents of the online inquisition is perhaps the most significant aspect of an ongoing saga, even more than the fascinating clash between conventional old Ulster and the new liberal Northern Ireland. What strikes me as especially interesting is how a persecuted minority eventually takes on the tactics of its persecutors. Gay rights lobbyists have a long history of aggressive activism, stretching back at least as far as demonstrating outside US cinemas screening ‘Basic Instinct’ and telling cinema-goers queuing up to look up Sharon Stone’s skirt how the film ends; they probably failed to see parallels between what they were doing and the Christian protests outside US cinemas when ‘Monty Python’s Life of Brian’ was on the circuit in 1979, but they’re essentially the same – a small group within society attempting to dictate what the far larger numbers beyond it can or can’t see.

It’s not that long since Sikh protestors besieged a theatre staging a play they regarded as offensive and managed to force it off the stage; a few months back, an exhibition on the contentious subject of the slave trade was pulled following similarly intimidating opposition. And the more the self-righteous zeal of such groups hijacks the media, the louder the calls of ‘It’s political correctness gone mad!’ In a sense, the impact is ultimately counterproductive for those who have fought and achieved a ban on something that they consider offensive, for it immediately gives the green light to old-school bigots to pose as the voice of reason by dusting the cobwebs off a few vintage prejudices; and anyone who doesn’t actually believe Bernard Manning was an unfairly marginalised working-class hero, but who dares to voice an opinion questioning the pro-censorship stance of pressure groups, is immediately lumped in with the likes of Kelvin McKenzie.

On a daily basis, one is confronted on social media by another petition to ban this or that because it is offensive, to demand so-and-so be sacked for saying something that cannot be said in public, to play judge, jury and online executioner. The people who engineer such campaigns probably regard themselves as libertarians in favour of equality for every perceived minority group they speak on behalf of in an incredibly patronising manner, and would no doubt be insulted should anyone suggest that their efforts are actually no different from those who once demanded the killers of James Bulger be hanged. But I see no difference; the message is implicitly the same – sign this or you are in bed with the scum we’re against. Had the man who ordered the gay cake wanted its icing sugar message to read ‘Niggers Go Home’, the outrage would have been reversed and it would be the customer rather than the baker who would now be branded Public Enemy Number One.

Personally, I find it remarkably immature to scream and scream something be banned merely because it offends one’s own point of view. While there are naturally some fundamental shared decencies that form the foundation stones of civilisation, go beyond these basic beliefs and nobody has any right to censure anyone else on the basis that they express an opinion contrary to their own unless it is written in law. As you grow up, you learn to accept (or should learn to accept) that some people are actually going to disagree with you. This very blog is a forum for the healthiest kind of debate, somewhere there is no consensus other than that of commentators refraining from personal attacks; and when these occasionally happen, the guilty parties are taken to one side and quietly advised to behave themselves. A consensus, or the desire to enforce one within society at large, is a far greater threat to our democracy than, say, Radical Islam, however.

From Dapper Laughs to Clarkson-gate, the past few months have seen an upsurge of this kind of trial-by-social media, and the longer it goes on the more hesitant those in the public eye will become of speaking their mind if it happens to contradict this consensus and will instead say what everyone else says if only for a quiet life. Politicians with power in their grasp have already mastered this bland Newspeak, which is yet another reason why those who don’t subscribe to it, such as Farage, Galloway or Bo-Jo, have captured so much attention in recent years.

A perennial subject on here that I’d rather not mention at the moment is a classic example of successfully silencing deviations from the consensus, of threat by intimidation and of interpreting any opposition as a case of sympathy for the Devil. Both are prime examples of the new Puritanism that has sprouted from the seeds planted by those who were once victims of virtually identical bullying; rather than triumphing over their one-time enemy by attempting to establish a more tolerant and socially enlightened society and learning from the mistakes of their predecessors, they and those they have passed on the torch to have instead gone from poacher to gamekeeper in the space of a generation.

And where does this leave us? A society in which people are wary of saying anything in public that might be deemed ‘controversial’ for fear of a twittering flock flying overhead and raining down a shower of cyber-shit until the comment is retracted and a shame-faced apology issued before a blinding blizzard of epilepsy-inducing flash photography? Perhaps some of the affordable housing Gideon has promised the homeless masses if they vote for his party should include priest-holes as part of their design; then at least those who instinctively rebel against any consensus will have somewhere to run and hide should the urge to say something that might cause offence suddenly afflict them. As long as they keep it to themselves and don’t tweet it, they should be safe.

I do wonder if it is only in the “English-speaking world” that has perverted the ability for nation to speak to nation into an eternal bitch-fest. Do German and French and Italian and Russian twitter users spend all their time screeching at one another in Deutsch, Francais, Italiano and Cyrillic about how much they each hate their fellow-man and despise everything their miserable views espouse.

True. The first time I walked down an Italian street I wondered what catastrophically divisive event had caused all the furious arguments. I gradually realized that this was the normal tone for amicable conversations between friends and strangers alike.

“they probably failed to see parallels between what they were doing and the Christian protests outside US cinemas when ‘Monty Python’s Life of Brian’ was on the circuit in 1979, but they’re essentially the same – a small group within society attempting to dictate what the far larger numbers beyond it can or can’t see.”

It’s all about control isn’t it though ” You have to bake my cake, put me and my chum up in your B&B, do the photography for our ‘wedding, or else we’ll scream and wail about how ‘uinfair’ it is that you have a varying opinion” The idea of going to a different baker, photo shop, B&B must never be mentioned because -gay innit. Personally I would be inclined to say to the wibbling hordes “Fine, I’ll do it and for no charge, but it will be the worst cake, filthiest room, most fucked up photos you have ever seen” Two can make a nasty point after all.

More likely what convicted sex offenders will be issued with to wear in the streets, perhaps with the words etched inside a yellow star sewn on their sleeve, so they can most easily be spotted by all vulnerable members of society. Prior to some final solution being worked out of course.

Probably a pink triangle if it was the queers you’d offended in some way. You could have a whole Government department dedicated to designing badges to denote offense to the different favoured groups, dedicated offenders such as myself could collect them, like scouting badges!

The earlier 20th century society to our own, that was associated with the “Permissive Society” was the Weimar Republic. They produced a startling movie about child sexual crime and then it was swept away by a popular political movement. It’s an intriguing parallel just now. The power of children manipulated by a small authoritarian elite. Fritz Lang’s M is especially intriguing in that it creates a “public court”, rather than a judicial one, for the final solution to Peter Lorre.

I suppose the important point is how the business is declined. If the customer is told, “Fuck off you filthy woofter, we don’t deal with your sort.” then the customer has a very good case. If told, “I’m sorry, but because of our Christian beliefs, I’m afraid I must decline your business.” then the customer is somewhat out of order making a huge fuss about it.

You wouldn’t barge into a Jewish delicatessen and demand a bacon roll, would you? So what’s different in this case?

But isn’t this exactly the point Anna? Why shouldn’t I be able to demand a bacon sandwich from a Jewish place, or a pork chop from a muslim restaurant? Surely my pathetic wants and inability to go elsewhere if my demands clash with someones beliefs absolutely trumps any views of theirs. Or perhaps that only applies when certain favoured groups demand that the majority change to accomodate them.

Robert, I’d say you have no right at all to demand such things. The owner is not obligated to sell EVERYTHING after all. They get to choose their menu. Maybe they won’t serve venison because their daughter saw Bambi in the movies and made them promise not kill little Bambis. The fact that the REASON for their decision stems from their religion is really irrelevant.

In Toronto, several kosher style restaurants (Meyers, Shopsy’s, Colemans, etc.) now serve pork products, such as bacon, ham, ribs, and sausage in order to serve a larger number of customers. Some kosher style hotdog restaurants, such as Max’s Famous Hotdogs and The Windmill, use pork as well as beef hot dogs.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosher_style

My point was that this is an illustration of “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others” which is the curse of society and has given us an ever more fragmented but hysterically vocal set of pressure groups. I’m guessing the restaurant would still be Jewish, but NOT kosher

I really don’t see the problem here, I’ve been asked to do work that I don’t particularly want to do. Only the other day I was talking about a tiling job where someone wanted their bathroom tiling in bottle green splash tiles. They made me feel seasick just looking at the things, I don’t want to do the job, I put in a ludicrously expensive quote. If they *Really* want me to do the job, then they’ll pay for it, usually they just go look for a cheaper quote.

As for the baker, “Yes Sir, we do cakes. How much you say? That all depends on what you want. A pink cake you say, with a big fairy on it and the words poofters of the world unite? Why certainly Sir, we can do that, (Sucks in air through teeth) but pink icing and a fairy, that’s pretty much a specialist job, and we’re going to have to outsource it. The weekend you say? Well we’re pretty busy this time of year, what with St Paddies day, the annual spring dinner dance for all the lodges etc. You’ll be looking at about £450? We do free delivery within a 3 mile radius, and I’ll require a deposit of £200 up front, shall we go ahead?”.

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” CS Lewis

The producers of Sesame Street could have got involved in the cake dispute as they have consistently denied that Bert and Ernie are “a couple”. They don’t clarify as to them not being a “couple of …” but I suspect that is what they mean. Either way the cake commissioners were infringing on their intellectual property. Of course the baker could have just said “I’m sorry but our order books are full – please try somewhere else”.

Although you’re obviously right about the reversal of outrage, I would think that a pro-“repatriation” message would probably transgress legislation in a way that one merely promoting gay marriage would not.

My own take on the whole gay marriage hoo-hah is a very simple one: extended the concept of civil partnerships to include opposite as well as same sex couple, and excluded any other legally-recognised form of union. People are free to “marry” in the church, mosque, temple, stone circle, or whatever of their choosing, and say they are “married” in the eyes of whatever faith they adhere to (or none), but for the state to recognise that union in a legal sense, they should also go through a separate civil partnership procedure. If they want to make the latter into something more elaborate than a simple witnessed legal process to the exclusion of any other separate ceremony or event, then fine, let them. Sorted.

I suspect that the drive for “gay marriage” was driven more by a desire to upset Christians than to achieve equality. I always thought that the benefits of being gay were that you couldn’t get married or join the army – yet they seemed to be the first two advantages that they wished to dispense with.

I’m reminded of the attitude of a gay in-law. He wouldn’t be seen dead in a gay bar or near the parade nonsense in Brighton. He was, very many years ago, my first face to face (no sniggers please) contact with someone I knew to be gay, excluding the camp pantomime dame stereotypes. I’ve met many of his friends & their partners, often been in a minority at social functions, but have never observed any gay rights activist amongst them. Maybe the need to demonstrate ones inclinations is a lack of confidence, maybe it’s a less admirable attitude, who knows? Those I met were indistinguishable from & like most others just getting on with their lives. No problem with people having a view about something, fracking, gay rights, trees, whatever, but I think there’s a limit to how much they should be allowed to infringe on the rights of others, or demand some kind of equality which always means preference. It’s gone too far.

If I’m allowed to generalise: A certain section of gay men idolise strong women (from Hollywood divas to pop icons), hence many ADORED Mrs Thatcher, so I’m not surprised by that right-wing propensity you saw. What always shocks me are the number of gays who read (and worse, believe everything in) The Daily Mail.

I’ve always been puzzled by the obsession with theatre, especially Sondheim & Elaine Page, but it could just be the particular set I’ve met. A lot of very long term relationships, & caring friendships, too. I think you’re right about the right wing bent. Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

When you think about it, theatre, especially among those who were already adult in 1967, was a natural form of identification. Gays had to perform every single day of our lives to get by, either by being closeted and acting straight, or going to the other effeminate extreme to be acceptable entertainment to the masses.

Even now, my favourite entertainment is science fiction (film/videos/books) where there is a different, better, escapist future (even in dystopias) from what is sometimes a repetitive and boring life (if you are gay or HIV+, you find that coming out is an ongoing process with every new group you meet… and let’s not have the discussion that it doesn’t have to be this way. Being open about who one is should be no more controversial than one’s height – but as many comment threads show, it is, as it is perceived to be “rubbing people’s noses in it”).

People who disagree with another’s viewpoint make a choice whether or not to be offended. In the case of the baker’ s potential customers they deliberately chose to be offended and deliberately made a public fuss (though if I were the baker I would have suggested Laurel and Hardy on the cake as they were a couple who shared a bed in some of their films). A more recent example is the prima donna Elton John who threw his kids toys out of the pram following a personal viewpoint of a handbag salesman. He could have said (or written a song with the words) “The man is a fool and I disagree with him.” but instead he instigated an hysterical public outpouring of luvvie support. I don’t like John’s music or lifestyle but I choose not to be offended, so no national demand for him to be banned from performing, then!

It’s the old “YOU can’t have sweets, because I’M on a diet” argument – illogical, selfish and ultimately denying to all that which might only offend the few. Thirty years ago it was the video nasties… To me, the current cases just seem like the latest step in eroding the concept of individual responsibility. Most people can exercise sufficient intelligence to change the channel, or NOT buy that DVD, or ignore those people whose views may differ. Unfortunately, those few who can’t – or at least make out that they can’t – are the ones to whom the powers that be seem to pay the most attention. I’d be interested to know at what point in history this erosion began.

“Equality” was devised to divide society and cause its collapse (divide and conquer). It also removes our basic freedoms, such as freedom of contract, freedom of speech, property rights and conscientious objection. It’s why the KGB used to promote “equality” in the West so we destroy our culture from within. Of course, the agenda is mainly driven by our ‘own’ leftist seekers of a Marxist-Leninist ‘Utopia’ who have infiltrated just about every institution, from education to government and from churches to the media. Yuri Bezmenov explains all:

Mmmm… while not being entirely behind the baker bashers, (why give money to people who don’t like you?), what if the baker had refused them service because they were black? Either everyone is equal and if you provide a service you provide it for all (i.e. do you practise your religion every time you’re at an oven?), or you allow complete and obvious discrimination on any grounds (i.e. I won’t serve queers, blacks, Jews, Moslems or women because I don’t believe in it) so that people know where they stand and can take their custom elsewhere.

Any law that legislates for equality will obviously be tested, just to see how far that equality goes. As for matrimony, I’m fully with Peter Raite’s suggestion of equal civil partnerships. As for the recent gay marriage vote – distraction tactics. “Look at how progressive we are!. Look over here! This should keep you busy for a while, but don’t watch what else we’re doing or with whom elsewhere.” Gays as political footballs again. From a man who spoke and voted in favour of Section 28, David Cameron.

Reading the story, I did get the impression that this was a ‘targetted’ thing on a baker who was known to have certain views, something I regard as despicable. Are people allowed opinions? You say we don’t allow obvious discrimination, I do wonder if that would be the case in a black area with a ‘no whites’ sign, or a republican area of Belfast and ‘no english’; the perpetually offended seem to operate on a one way system.

Well two points: 1: if he were targeted for his views, surely it makes no difference: the law is the law and applies to everyone by which follows 2: I’d happily fight any Moslem/Black organisation that said no whites/queers/Anglo Saxons etc. I believe (but am not entirely sure) that the law is designed to protect those it deems as “minorities” but I hope I’m wrong and the law would be clarified if challenged that way. Equality should, as you point out, be a two way street (and to be fair, most gay bars don’t discriminate against people they perceive to be “straight” , as far as I am aware, anyway).

I don’t think it is that people are not allowed to have opinions – it’s that they are not allowed to act upon them if that leads to discrimination. Unfortunately, I can see both sides of the argument on that one (sorry, my wet liberal hand-wringing moment).

Story on the BBC Wild Service last night that a Chinese eaterie in Kenya has posted a “No Africans after 5pm” sign and sid it is because they are worried about al-shabbab. Fiendishly clever the Chinese I always think…

what if the baker had refused them service because they were black? They weren’t refusing to serve the customers but refusing to decorate the cake in the way they asked. It seems more comparable with vegetarian bakers being asked to decorate a cake with models of cuts of meat, then being accused of discrimination if they refuse.

If I had been the Only Gay In A Xian Bakery then I might have countered with “when our Lord fed the 5000, when he gave bread to 5000 people, do you really think every single one of those 5000 were straight?”

The people then, like ever since, would have been sinful in diverse ways. But, Herr Dwarf, the 5,000 came to listen to wise council and sage instruction, which would not have included the blessing to engage in homosexual behaviour. Furthermore, the Lord makes it perfectly clear that marriage is between one man and one woman, as it was from the beginning.

IIRC, there is absolutely nothing in any of the four Gospels that recounts Jesus saying anything whatsoever about homosexuality. Given that we know the early Church at one point filtered out a lot of stuff it didn’t like, it seems odd that if such testimony existed, it wasn’t left in, if JC was down on the gays.

As it is, even the four bits elsewhere in the New Testament that may refer to homosexuality are open to interpretation. Paul was a dreadful old mysogynist, but only mentioned homosexuality and lesbianism once, which can probably indicate his priorities.

Peter Raite – Scripture must be taken as a whole to see the “Big Picture”. As I said to the B.D., marriage between one man and one woman is the blueprint for humanity. It’s in Genesis and the Lord confirmed it to the people. Jesus said nothing (in the four gospels, anyway) about bestiality or necrophilia (for example), but He surely didn’t need to. Some things are a bit too obvious.

So many people today in the West think homosexual “partners” are acceptable – normal even – because they’ve been brainwashed into it. “Gay marriage” was never legalised by any government or monarch anywhere in the world at any time in history, prior to the last few years of “PC gone mad” for good reason.

I don’t believe in the institution of marriage, gay or straight, so I can’t contribute to this debate. I’m neither a believer nor a campaigner. If two people love each other, that is enough for me. Let it be.

Christianity rejects much of the Old Testament, otherwise I wouldn’t have been eating prawns last night. The New Testament are the surviving fragments of religious text that were extant long enough for the early Church to consciously decide which bits to authorise and keep, and which bits to reject. Given how accepted forms of homosexuality were in the contemporary Roman and Greek world, Jesus not mentioning the subject at all is more than a little suspiscious. Oh, and if Genesis sets the bar as “one man and one woman,” then how come that elsewhere in the Old Testament there are plenty of references to polygamy? You can’t have it both ways (oo-er!).

Generally people aren’t “brainwashed” into accepting homosexuality, but rather they are no longer socially conditioned to not accept it in the first place, and it’s certainly not the only concept that applies to. Eternal damnation for onanism, anyone?

Given that we know the “official” New Testament is more than a bit of a mash-up of much earlier but now lost sources, it hard not to be suspiscious about the “gaps.” For example, it seems likely that women had a much more direct role in the early Church, but were gradually forced out.

” For example, it seems likely that women had a much more direct role in the early Church, but were gradually forced out.”

There is enough still left in the NT to say for fairly certain that women had a greater role in the early church than was later the case. Unfortunately, from a theological point of view, those verses have now been hijacked by those wanting the ordination of women.

“…certainly the bible only knows MF marriage…but the singular is a bit less clear.”

While some of the patriarchs and kings had several wives (or hundreds in Solomon’s case), the blueprint was for a man to leave his parents and cleave to his wife, like the original format of Adam and Eve.

” the blueprint was for a man to leave his parents and cleave to his wife, like the original format of Adam and Eve.”

I think ‘blueprint’ might be going a bit beyond the biblical evidence…the whole ‘husband of one wife’ thing. Certainly the 1xM 1xF option seems to be the ‘ideal’ but I’d be a bit wary going beyond that.

The 5,000 actually indicated ONE man who was a collector of subscriptions on behalf of King Herod. The ‘5,000’ was in charge of a number of collectors, (and was a high ranking official, but not an ordained member of the faith) to ensure the subscription was sufficient for the king. Many of the Jewish race had left their homeland (the diaspora) but wished to maintain their religion in Israel. For their subscriptions they received a pebble with a picture of a fish on it.

That sounds horribly like the sort of nonsense the Unspeakable Antipodean would come out with. Does she back it up with any kind of real evidence/proof? Has someone unearthed, say, a horde of fishy stones? Herod’s tax records (and you can be damn sure he kept some)? That’s a serious question btw- it is over a decade since i was last ‘up’ on biblical archaeology and one of the things about the Judean desert is its ability to surprise.

I hope he was trying to draw the distinction between “paedophile” and “gay”. I’m not sure he entirely succeeded. The fact he believed he needed to say that kind of reinforces the connection in some people’s minds.

More likely briefed as to what this was all about in the first place and doing his job as he saw it, to keep the establishment safe.

“Peter Righton said that when he was in residential work he had had sexual relations with 8 or 9 boys. He was very keen to stress that the boys were post-pubescent, that he never put any undue pressure on them having sex, and also that he went on remaining friendly with these boys until adulthood and in relation to one or two, became godfather to their children. He knew me to be a lesbian and he assumed a group loyalty, and assumed that he could trust me with this information and –err- that assumption, at that time, was an accurate one for him to make.http://jimcannotfixthis.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/right-on-time.html

“Even more unfortunate applied to ‘slims, who practice it with joyful abandon as we speak.”

Trust me, there are enough Xians who still have a hankering for the Good Old Ways. Mind you, most of them, unlike the Muslims, have advanced technologically since the Paleolithic and prefer made man mini-metal rocks propelled not by the Arm of God but gunpowder.

I am reminded of the PROTESTS (including ‘terorrist’ firebombings) against The Last Temptation Of Christ, which a large chunk of Xianity found offensive ,probably cos they didn’t realise that was all in the bible and as ‘biblical’ as say the Xmas Story. Oh sorry, did anyone think it was Muslims and Gays who get their speedos or djerbas in a twist about such things or whom the MSM backed down to?

I recall one interview with some frothy mouthed Xian who was protesting outside a cinema in the US, I think, who proclaimed; “I can not imagine my Saviour in bed with a WOMAN [sic-including the emphasis]. I so wished the Reporter had countered “but with a Man?”…as I did screaming at the Radio several thousands of miles distance – and before anyone grizzles (SC I’m looking at you Buddy) there are inferences in the NT that Jesus was gay. I don’t think he was and I believe he wasn’t but honesty compels me to say that a case for it can be made scripturally….albeit a weak case IMO.

“The film includes a disclaimer explaining that it departs from the commonly accepted Biblical portrayal of Jesus’ life, and is not based on the Gospels.” It also has Him taken down from the cross (invisibly) by his guardian angel, marrying Mary Magdelane and producing sprogs, then marrying the daughters of Laqzarus when she died (more sprogs). You don’t actually have to be a swivel eyed loon to think this was a bit of a piss take, especially as the guardian angel also says that though God is pleased with Him, He isn’t the messiah, I mean, pardon me while I piss on every Christian belief from the beginning of the world to date!* Just imagine if you made a film showing mo as a child molesting epileptic nutter who commited rape, murder, robbery and pretty much whatever else he liked by saying “Oh, I just had a vision from this allah guy, he said it was ok”

* OK, bombing theatres is a bit much, but part of the response was down to the MSM telling Southern Baptists how they should lighten up and not take it so seriously.

I know. I didn’t say it was but that it was as biblical as the Xmas Story. However, as far as I can recall, like unto the the whole Jesus being a young boy buggerer thing, all (or most of) the elements of the film can be inferred from the bible.

Quick example to save on confusion, Jesus’s own family thought he was a raving loon, that’s what it says in the Gospel (Mark 3:21). Now most Xians would try and ‘get round’ that difficult verse using some mindnumbingly obtuse theological (or bibleological) arguments but even the most frothy mouthed would have to admit that the passage might be read that way,/i> (ie the way it is inscribed in the codex).

Mark might indeed be read that way, or read “what the fuck were you thinking of, bringing this shower here?” , or read, somewhat obtusely, that the CROWD was mad with seeing Him, or probably half a dozen other ways, depending on how accurate you think the translations out of the Greek were. The point is that the film and the 1953 book were quite the ‘lets see how many people we can piss off’ style of thing, it was banned loads of times after all and I personally found it hard going and the film just plain weird, what with Jesus going around dobbing in Jewish rebels to the Romans and Judas having been sent to bump him off; if you’d changed the names a bit and set it in Chicago c1930 it would have made a good gangster movie.

and what do you suppose Christ meant when he screamed out “My God why hast thou forsaken me?”. While I don’t agree with the LT’s idea of a final temptation on the cross , it is not ‘unbiblical’ -especially when you consider the ‘let this cup’ etc

Well, in the FILM, the guardian angel has taken him off, which is when she explains how he isn’t the Messiah, but, what the hell, I imagine being nailed up for saying ‘let’s try being nice to one another’ probably hurts a bit! Also, there is the whole “This is my only Son, in whom I am well pleased” which does tend to put the mockers on the book version.

It occurs to me I haven’t actually watched the film in a long time. Must sail away to a certain bay and find a copy. Now THAT will upset Mrs Dwarf, who is definitely a member of the Four Square Loony Toons Church of God The Awesome.

I was wondering if the two of us have it partly confused with ‘The Passion of the Christ’ too. My copy was a directors cut which had a few things in that the regular version had apparently cut, have to dig it out, the book too.

Brian certainly isn’t the Messiah, but Jesus is clearly present as a separate character in the film. The famous TV showdown between Cleese and Palin on one side, and Malcolm Muggeridge and the Bishop of Southwark on the other, went the way it did because while obviously the two Pythons were very familiar with what was in the film, the other two had arrived late for the screening they were supposed to see, and so missed all the bits that made the distinction between Brian and Jesus more than clear.

I genuinely think they do, which makes their actions all the more ironic in that they’re just as bullish in imposing their viewpoint on the masses as the Mary Whitehouses of this world were before them – a parallel I’m sure they’d be appalled by.

One day – when business is bad and unemployment is high – is it not likely that some persuasive fellow will rise up and rouse the discontented masses blaming all their woes on the ‘unaturally powerful’ and trouble making group. Well if you look into history thats how it is done. Usually a lot of ‘unaturally powerful blood is spilt after this.

Hardly original, Sad lass, and let’s face it, don’t many body parts have dual use? I’m imagining your tongue has encountered more than a curly wurly in your life. Personally. I like a curry…. butI’m not sure you need to know what I do, or do not, like.

Wasn’t intended to be original, as if it was, the quip would have had to be complete. Moreover, the quip is not completed by ‘their mouths’ or even ‘their tongues’, either of which would make sense, but hardly complete the well known phrase or saying.

Perhaps ‘curly wurly’ is a euphemism, but one I cannot find appropriately described on the internet, so top marks for originality, ‘nul points’ for clarity.

As it happens, the invitation to create a cake celebrating gay marriage which is unlawful in Northern Ireland is a clear case of entrapment, because even if the bakers had done it, there is an argument that they shouldn’t have. Jim (below) has it in a nutshell.

For the life of me I can’t understand how this can be seen as discrimination of the grounds of the sexuality of the customer. Because the baker could have no idea whether the customer was gay or not, and indeed it wouldn’t have mattered if he was straight. It was the message that the baker disapproved of NOT the customer. If the same refusal to serve would have been given to a heterosexual customer demanding the same cake (and given the bakers religious views that seems almost certain) then by definition there can be no discrimination on the grounds of the customers sexuality. It is pure discrimination on the grounds of disagreement with the views of the customer, which is perfectly legal. If I walk into a cake shop in a former mining town and ask them to bake a cake depicting Mrs T as the saviour of the nation, I can guess what the response would be. Go forth and multiply, if I was lucky, a good kicking if I wasn’t.